How many times have you found yourself headed into the company holiday party thinking, “I hope I don’t end up stuck in a conversation in the corner with someone”? Then, five minutes later, you’re stuck in a boring conversation in the corner with someone? Or, you’re trying to make a statement around the boss during a group conversation and you just can’t figure out what to say? Or (and maybe worst of all), you’re in a meeting and in front of all of the influential people someone asks, “So what do you think?”
Impromptu speaking isn’t just important around the holidays, but this time of year we’re all more likely to be in a conversation with people who challenge our ability to communicate effectively. Today we bring you a great mentor on the topic, Matt Abrahams, who’s not only an expert communicator, but he’s so good that he teaches the topic at Stanford University and hosts a podcast on the topic.
That’s not all the communicating we’ll do, though. We’ll also discuss a recent Wall Street Journal piece which shares how much money people think they need to make before they’ll finally be happy. That will lead us into a deeper conversation about what it really takes to be happy…and it turns out the answer might not be what you expect.
That’s not all! Of course, we’ll also have some trivia from Doug, share the life line question, and more.
Deeper dives with curated links, topics, and discussions are in our newsletter, The 201, available at https://www.stackingbenjamins.com/201
Enjoy!
Our Headlines
- The Pay Raise People Say They Need to Be Happy (Wall Street Journal)
- Joe Smith on Blowing Through His $61 Million NBA Fortune: ‘It Was a Very Low Point’ (Complex)
Matt Abrahams

Big thanks to Matt Abrahams for joining us today. To learn more about Matt, visit Matt Abrahams – Professor, Podcast Host, Author, Speaker, and Martial Artist. Grab yourself a copy of the book Think Faster, Talk Smarter: How to Speak Successfully When You’re Put on the Spot
Doug’s Trivia
- Which living U.S. president was paid a record $750,000 for a speaking engagement?

Need life insurance? You could be insured in 20 minutes or less and build your family’s safety net for the future. Use StackingBenjamins.com/HavenLife to calculate how much you need and apply.
- Stacker Garrett has a question about what to do with his HSA when he changes jobs, given that the new job doesn’t have that option.
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Written by: Kevin Bailey
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Episode transcript
I must stop
this whole thing, but for
53 years I’ve put up with
it now, I
must stop Christmas from
coming.
Live from Joe’s mom’s basement, it’s the Stacking Benjamins show.
I’m Joe’s mom’s neighbor Doug, today you’ll learn how to speak successfully when you’re pregnant. Put on the spot with Stanford professor Matt Abrahams. In our headlines, how much money does it take for you to be happy? Would 60 million dollars make you happy? We’ll share some surprising findings on that topic.
Plus we’ll throw out a lifeline to stacker Garrett, or Jarrett? I don’t know. Jarrett wants to know where to invest. the money he’s been putting towards an HSA once he switches jobs. And then, like a dream, I’ll share some amazing trivia. And now, two guys who get paid the big bucks to tell you everything they know about personal finance.
It’s Joe and oh, J
J J J G! Hey
stackers, that’s right. We’re where it’s at. If you consider 1. 37 the big bucks. Welcome to the Stacking Benjamins podcast. I’m Joe Saul Sehy. Average Joe Money on Twitter, on X, on whatever you call it, and across the card table from me to make your Wednesday phenomenal as you rebuild your wallet after Cyber Monday.
It’s Mr. OG. How are you, man? Hmm.
Yeah. In fact, I’m just texting somebody right now about all the checks that I’ve written in the last week. It’s pretty demoralizing, honestly. And the checks that are upcoming, because, you know, January is not a great month for annual payments. You know, things like taxes.
Gross.
Well, the good news is we got a set. I was wondering why you were wearing a hard hat to today’s recording. That must be why you got the hard hat on. You got the construction outfit off to work. It’s a, well, it’s a
great day though. Oh, I thought that was part of his. YMCA gear.
As I
said, that or the village people are coming to town and I’m a big fan.
It could be, could be both. Well, one village person we have with us today, Stanford professor Matt Abrahams joining us. Oh, gee, as Doug said, we’re gonna. We’re going to not just navigate those holiday parties. And for those of you new to Stacking Benjamins, we talk about this every year, but you know what?
Oh, gee, good communication works all year long. And maybe explaining to the tax assessor why you, uh, might need a short term extension, extension, a short term loan, something.
Oh, they’re happy to extend it at the low, low rate of 1. 5 percent per month.
It’s going to be great.
Yes. Getting a credit card for your
tax bill.
Lots of headlines before that, but, but uh, listen, on Monday you talked about the leftovers. Do you still have any leftovers left in the fridge? A little bit.
My favorite obviously has to be,
see, I think that’s so gross. But stuffing, I think we stood Doug, he’s wrong about stuffing. Yeah,
absolutely. I, we’ve had this conversation before.
I think so much less of OG now. Wow,
Doug, uh, listen, you can’t swear that much when you talk about stuffing on the show. This is a family show, my friend. We’ve got Matt Abrahams coming up. We’ve got, uh, no stuffing. This is a lean mean podcast machine here today. So let’s get moving. Hello darlings. And now it’s time for your favorite part of the show, our Stacking Benjamins headlines.
Our headline comes to us, uh, from The Wall Street Journal. Oh, gee, you found this one, the pay raise. People say they need to be happy. Written by Joe Pinkster. This was a problem. Oh, gee, that I had when I was horrible with money, which was, I just always thought if I get another raise, if I make a little more money, that will solve my problem.
And it turns out I’m not the only person who thinks that, uh, Joe writes, people are often convinced their lives would improve if only they could climb. A few rungs on the income ladder. Totally true. And they are right to an extent. Many studies have found a link between income and happiness, both in terms of day to day mood and longer term life satisfaction.
Having more money would help many people afford necessities, and on average, richer people report being happier. But exactly how much more money do we think we need to be happy? A new survey from the financial service company Empower put that question to 2, 000 people. And they say it would take a pretty significant pay bump to deliver contentment.
Listen to this. The respondents who had a median salary of 65, 000 a year said if you just made it 95, 000, that would make them happy and less stressed. The highest earners with a median income of 250, 000, 250, 000 that is, said that if I made 350, 000, I would finally, finally get happy. Oh, gee, it’s Wow.
Turns out we need a significant pay bump to get there. And if you ask
the people at 350, they want 600. It’s a never ending battle. It’s like that really iconic scene. Some people hated it. I thought it was great. That scene in the Star Wars movie. Sorry. Spoiler alert coming. If you haven’t seen whatever episode this is, it’s one of the last ones where Kylo Ren’s standing there and he’s like, just blasting the heck out of Luke Skywalker.
And he just, he’s like, Lord, he’s just, I want more, you know, more power. But that doesn’t solve the problem. If you have bad spending, if you have bad savings, if you have bad enjoyment in life, regardless of how much money you have, you’re not going to be happy with more. You’re just going to want more.
I always thought that if I just made a little more money, my problems would go away.
And you know what? I made, I believe, 85, 000 that year. When things were really falling apart, my income, that was definitely up. And by the way, OG, this was in 1993 money. So if we look at prices doubling every 18 years, that means equivalent this year, I made about 170, 000 bucks. Right? Yeah. I could have made, instead of 85, if I would have made 95, 000, I would have spent 110.
If I would have made 110, I would have spent 130. If I made 130, I would have spent, like, my money habits were so bad. It is the biggest lie I think so many of us are living. And the bad news is, according to this piece, employers on average this year, planning a 3. 9 percent pay raise if you’re non union. Of course, you know, auto manufacturers, uh, unions were able to get them a different pay bump than that.
But non union people 3. 9 percent in 2024, big difference between that and a 50 percent or a 33 percent pay raise we think it’s going to take to make us happy. Yeah. And I think that if
you just look at the people that have had this happen to them, uh, you’re a great example. I have a very similar story. I started financial planning in 1999.
My first year I made 10, 000. I remember thinking, if I could just make 30, 000, like all of the problems would go away. And the next year I made 30, 000 and it didn’t go away. And then a year after that, I got married and Uh, my new bride made 40, 000, and I was like, well, heck, if she’s making 40, 000 and I’m making 30, 000, holy crap, we have so much money, it’s insane, and then we didn’t, and then it was like, if I could just make 100, 000, life would be great, and I made 100, 000, or we made 100, 000 as a family, and it’s like, all these different milestones that I’ve thought of over the years, I’ve accomplished every single one of them, But I can’t tell you that, I, I certainly have more stuff, that’s for sure.
I have a bigger house payment than I did, than the rent was in 99 or 2003. But, but from a happiness standpoint, it doesn’t feel any different, honestly. I think that there’s probably some truth to the fact that at some level, there’s some sustenance required, right? Like, some family dollar amount that needs to be achieved to like, be able to shelter and put food on the table.
And that takes away a ton of stress. And I think… Just based on some anecdotal stuff. I think that number is about 60 to 80 thousand dollars depending on where you live And you know your cost of living in your area and that sort of thing If you have a family and you’re making under 60 K I’m betting it’s pretty stressful and yes getting to 60 or 80 will probably alleviate some of that stress However, if you’re already there 80 grand My lips are just above water if I could just get to a hundred That’s not going to solve the problem.
You’re just going to expand your lifestyle unless you put systems in place ahead of time. I saw
a great quote from a actor and comedian, Jim Carrey, yesterday, Jim talking about the fact that, uh, what he thinks most people need is to become really wealthy and really famous so they can do whatever the hell they want and they get the stardom that they think is going to help them.
He said, For everybody to realize that that’s not the answer and Jim has talked very openly about how he was in a deep depression once he realized he could do anything he wanted and he could have anything very close to anything he wanted. He still realized that that’s an empty pit. It’s just there’s there’s nothing there.
You know, recently I saw an article on, I don’t remember which news outlet, but one of the major ones. They were reporting on, like so many do now, they report on something they see on social media. I mean, what, what kind of show does that? Who has social media? Anyway. Oh, Joe! Anyway, there was a woman on TikTok who was in tears.
about how they’re living paycheck to paycheck. And she goes on and talks about how, I think if I, if I remember it, right, that both she and her husband both make six figures after they get paid and they make their house payment and their car payments and, uh, put some gas in their cars, they’ve got like three or 400 to last them the next two weeks.
What the article completely neglected to say. And I think because maybe she neglected to say in TikTok was what. the outflow is. What are their, what are their liabilities? And that frustrates me. She immediately blamed everything on inflation. Oh, inflation’s killing us. And I think it’s so easy to find the cop out and not realize it’s all about your behaviors and about
your spending.
Well, this is, I’m glad you brought that up because, uh, Joe in this piece quotes, uh, psychology professor Elizabeth Dunn. Elizabeth was on the show a couple of years ago. We’ll link to her appearance in the show notes. She says the impact of money on happiness isn’t as large as people typically assume.
Happiness is determined by so many factors that changing any one thing, it’s hard to have a huge impact. The biggest thing she says though, Is that although 7 in 10 people say that they strongly or somewhat agree with the statement, having more money would solve most of my problems. She says that many people would be happier if they focused on the best ways to use the money they have rather than getting more of it.
I think this is planning season. It’s a great time, OG, to set out what do I want to do in 2024? Because I think about the times when I’m happiest. It’s when I’m my money and my actions. are very much aligned with the goals I set out for myself. If I look back on the times that I was truly knocking it out of the park when things were going really well for me, it’s when I set up goals and I was knocking them down.
One of the greatest kind of annual read books that I have, I think we all have books that we get through once a year, you know, you just go, Oh, I got to read that book again. Uh, it’s called Mastery by George Leonard. I don’t know if anybody has seen, if you guys have seen that. The concept of that book is, to be good at stuff, you have to enjoy the process of trying to be good at stuff.
And, like, getting to the good, getting to where you want to be, is not actually the best part of it. The best part has to be the process associated with the plateau, is what they talk about. There’s lots of, you know, periods in time in life where you just are where you are. You know, you’re not making any significant progress, or it doesn’t seem like it.
And that’s the same thing with your money stuff. We look at the last, I mean, this is a great example of the last couple of years of market performance, right? 2022, it was down. Beginning of 23, it started coming back up again. Fall of 23, it’s down. The last six weeks back up again, you know, and you just kind of look and you go, it just kind of feels like the last couple of years have been treading water.
It doesn’t, I’m not making any progress on my money goals. It’s like, no, no you are. This is the part where you are making the progress. You don’t see the progress. Because the results haven’t come in yet. The progress happens from the doing, not from the, you know, not from the results part of it. So you’re stuffing money away, you’re putting money in your retirement plan, you’re buying shares at lower prices than they were a year and a half or two years ago.
And you’ll see the results of this. As the market turns and proceeds ever higher as it, as it will, but you don’t see it today. Same thing with compounding. You don’t see the compounding benefit. You know, you’re, you’re in year six of your 401k and you’re like, I don’t see this compounding thing these guys are talking about.
It’s like, no, that happens when you’re 55. When you go from a million to two million in seven years, that’s when that happens. So you have to do the work today to get the progress. And the win, so to speak, later. Gotta
build that foundation. You know, speaking of, uh, lack of a foundation, and, uh, having enough money, we said, you know, maybe 60, 000 OG doesn’t feel like enough, so we make it 90, 000, or if we got 250, 000, we’d be happy if we had 350, 000.
What do you think if you had 61 million, would you be happy then?
I feel like I could make it work. Honestly. I feel like, I feel like, you know, as I’ve often said, I’m not ashamed of this. I buy, every month I buy the same Powerball tickets. I buy one ticket, but I just pay it for the entire month, so I don’t have to go to the gas station and look like a…
Dork. I just look like a dork once when the guy goes, that’s 90, sir. Like I know what I’m doing. I mean,
I got my tickets for the next six weeks, but I feel
like 61 million would be like that where it’s like, you know, all of a sudden OG wins the lottery. It’s like, dude, dude, dude, we’re sorry. The number you’ve called is no longer
in service.
And all of a sudden check the number. Try again. All of a sudden podcast. I’ll sell my shares to you, Joe. This headline comes to us from, uh, Complex, uh, written by, uh, Brad Kallis. Joe Smith, who was the number one overall pick in the 1995 NBA draft, played for Maryland, uh, has been opening up about how Good basketball player.
Yeah. Opening up about how he blew through the 61 million he made. during nearly two decades in the league. He says that his MBA earnings dwindled down to just 3, 000. Though he earned more than 61 million during his time in the NBA. He claims he only took home about 18 million after taxes, agent fees and management fees.
Again, though, 18 million. You think you might be able to make it work on that. He says though, getting down to his last 3000 was a very low point. He said, uh, Like when I say I was in a deep, deep, deep depression, like mentally messed up, I’m telling you, I was there. Smith continued, I bought my mom’s house in Virginia, I bought a house in the Bay, I bought a house in Milwaukee.
Those are three houses I bought and lost a lot of money to get them off my hands, so that’s when the issue came on the other end too. I didn’t make anything off the houses once I had to sell them. In addition to buying several houses and a fleet of luxury cars, he blames his costly divorce with him going broke.
So he bought depreciating assets and a fleet of cars. He had a costly divorce. You know, um, a lot of talk lately, people talking about the importance O. G. of prenups and what a prenup could do or fail to do if you fail to to have one. And then third, having to sell an appreciating asset like a house at a time when the market’s down because you don’t have any other recourse.
very incredibly difficult.
And then I just read an article about Jeff Bezos’s new boat that costs 153, 000 a day to operate.
It’s so big that it needs another boat to follow it. No joke. They, they built two, they built the one that he has, which is too big to go to any port. So they had to put it in the shipping container port in Miami. Cause that was the only, what are they called? Doug slips, I guess. Yeah. The only place to put them, the only place to park it.
was big enough where the shipping containers go and they have another boat that follows it around that’s, uh, you know, I don’t know what it does, but they call it tender pictures of the other one. I guess maybe it’s a photo
ship. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to afford a, uh, a midlife crisis that’s that deep.
Like, if I could just afford to, you know what, I’ve, I’m in my fifties now, or maybe I don’t know how old Bezos is, sixties. Now he’s in his fifties. You know, I’m feeling like I got to buy a bigger boat. He does
have the biggest one, I guess. Half a billion dollars, 153, 000 a day. That is some cheese, man. That is, just put that on the
Amex.
It is difficult. Well, if 61 million dollars won’t do it, I think that, uh, Jim Carrey’s got it right. Doesn’t matter, OG, how much money you got. The happiness, I think, is… Is coming from a different place, even though 10 of us believe more money makes us more happy. There is an
example that I like that, that I heard years ago and I just love it.
It was from Kenny Loggins. There was some interview on whatever, pick a show, 60 Minutes, 2020, whatever. They were interviewing Kenny Loggins and he had this amazing house in the Napa Valley that was just enormous. And Like, all of his kids had their own, like, kitchenettes in their bedroom areas, and they’re part of the house, and they realized that they never saw each other.
They had maids that went in and cleaned up the bedrooms, and the kids are eating whatever garbage they wanted to eat whenever they were eating, and the family just started to dissolve. He ended up selling that house, and I either built another smaller house on his property, or just bought a house. Like he could still see his previous house that was huge, but they made sure that none of that was in the new house.
And they had one family kitchen table and forced the family to come back together again and downsize significantly, even though it had, you know, he still had the money and lost his money, but he, you realize there are some things that have nothing to do with money. And he fixed a lot of his family problems.
He said just by changing that whole configuration. And I love that, that thought of approaching your problems
differently. I think that’s a great place to leave this conversation. We will have a deeper dive on this at the 201, our newsletter that comes out every Tuesday and Thursday. It’s absolutely free.
stackingbenjamins. com slash 201 gets you signed up for that. Okay. Coming up next, Matt Abrahams. is a lecturer in organizational behavior at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business. He teaches one of the most popular classes on campus, which is in strategic communication and effective virtual presenting, which is happening more and more.
Uh, I believe, uh, Matt’s probably forgotten more than the three of us ever knew about communication. He’s helped some of the top organizations in America either develop better communication, awesome roadshows. Of course, he’s consulted with little organizations like the United Nations secretary general strategic planning and communications office, and he has.
A fantastic podcast of his own, which is also the name of his book, Think Fast, Talk Smart. We’re going to teach you how to navigate communication. We’re going to be doing a lot of communicating this month. We’re going to see a lot of people. This is the time when we generally find ourselves grossed in small talk more than any other time in the year.
So, uh, Matt Abraham’s waiting in the wings, but between us and Matt. We’ve got a fantastic trivia question today, I think, Doug.
We sure do, Joe. Hey there, stackers! I’m Joe’s mom’s neighbor, Doug. Lately, I’ve been thinking about making a career change. Made a list of all the things I’m better at than most people, and after hours and hours of whittling that huge list down to only the highest paid options, I’ve decided I want to be a talk show host.
We’re looking smart and funny. Photogenic. You know, they say the camera adds 10 pounds, but for me, that is all muscle. That hosting gig’s gotta be an easy job, too. I mean, you just talk to celebrities and then smile at the audience when they cut to commercial. Easy stuff! Figure I already talk all day.
Might as well get paid millions for it. Plus, there are few certainties in this universe, but one of them is that once I finally get a chance to talk to someone like Jennifer Aniston or Halle Berry, they’ll become overwhelmed by my charm and fall in love with me. Boom! My financial issues, they just dissolve.
And even if I don’t like that job and decide to retire early, I can make a fortune from speaking fees after the show ends. Tons of people get paid just to talk in front of crowds after they retire. I mean, you got your athletes, you got your financial podcast hosts, even politicians, which is crazy, considering they talk so much for free.
So today’s trivia question is, Which living U. S. president was paid a record? 750, 000 for a speaking engagement. I’ll be back right after I practice reading a teleprompter.
Hey there, stackers, I’m talk show host and future Mr. Jennifer Aniston, Joe’s mom’s neighbor, Doug. According to MentalHelp. net, most people’s number one fear is public speaking. Second to that? Death, which means that most people would rather be dead than have to talk in front of a crowd. No wonder public speaking fees are so high.
Today’s trivia question is, which living U. S. president was paid a record 750, 000 for a speaking engagement? Although it was never confirmed by the event’s organizers, Ronald Reagan was paid a record 1 million for a speech he gave in Japan shortly after he left the White House. However, the president who earned the most among those that are still alive today, arguably a better condition, is President Bill Clinton.
The former president earned the hefty sum for a speech he gave in Hong Kong. I gotta become president! Doug 2024, people! slightly less crooked. And now here to teach you ways to conquer your fear of speaking on the spot, it’s Matt
Abrahams. And we’re super happy he’s here, the guy helping us get over these holiday party jitters.
I hope Matt Abrahams is here. How are you? I’m doing great. Excited to talk to you, Joe. Well, I’m excited to talk to you too, because as you know, this is the time of year, Matt, where we end up in a room full of strangers, whether it’s the neighborhood party, the holiday party for work, whatever it is. Are you comfortable in those situations?
I have become more comfortable in those situations. I certainly wasn’t for a good portion of my life, but I have grown more comfortable. I see it as fun as an opportunity to get to know people. And so I definitely lean into the situation. Now you
had to get good is what I heard because, well, the way things are organized at school, apparently as a kid you had to get good at, at talking off the cuff.
Am I wrong? No,
you’re not wrong at all. So, so having the last name, Abraham’s AB, I always knew where I would sit and I always knew who would go first. And so I have had a tremendous amount of experience. Practicing speaking in the moment. And people who are in the middle of the alphabet often would thank me in school and say, Wow, I’m just so glad I don’t sit where you sit.
And it turns out those of us at the beginning of the alphabet and end of the alphabet have to be spontaneous. I am spontaneous because I have no idea what’s going to be asked of me. And my friends whose last names start with Y and Z They were always like, I have to come up with something new and different because everybody said, you know, what I was going to say ahead of time.
So I think it’s in the middle, you get a little of the benefit.
Now for, uh, this particular project, but, but I don’t know, maybe it’s your career in general, Matt, at Stanford, you write that professors would call on people to see if they were prepared. And that was kind of the genesis of this, is that right?
Yeah, absolutely. So about nine years ago, the deans of the business school at Stanford came to me and said, we have a problem. Our really bright students are really struggling when the professor cold calls them on them. And the cold call is what you just described, where the teacher points at you and says, what do you think?
Our students knew the answer. They were well prepared, but they just could not articulate it. So the students felt nervous and uncomfortable, and the professors weren’t getting what they needed. So I was asked to see if I could help. And as a result of that request, I did a deep dive into the academic research in multiple fields.
Psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, even improvisation. And as a result, came up with a methodology. And ever since that day, for over eight years now, every Stanford MBA in their first year, in the first three weeks, has an opportunity to take this content, and the students who go through it say that they feel more comfortable and confident, and the professors are finally getting the responses they wanted.
And then I took this information into my consulting that I do, and the coaching, and it turns out to be helpful for everyone. And that’s what originated the book. It’s based on that methodology. Let’s
start there. Is that actually a good practice for professors to find out? Because it would seem like, Matt, if professors aren’t getting what they want, maybe that’s not a great practice when you’re talking to somebody anyway.
Well, so this is now getting into pedagogy. I absolutely, totally agree with you. I do, I never cold call my students. If anything, I warm call where I’ll say, later in the class, I’m going to ask a few of you to volunteer to share something, but it’s always on a volunteer basis. There are some. Who believe that in, in a cold call, uh, you, you actually can extract and engage in a, in an interesting educational opportunity.
I, for one, who does what I do, who studies what I do, who tries to help people feel more comfortable and confident, I don’t think we need more stressful situations around communication in our life, so I don’t do it. But because my colleagues do, I want to help those who have to, um, shall I say be victimized by that?
Do better.
This also, this conversation we’re about to have isn’t just about classrooms. Now for the holiday party, what we’re going to talk about, you, you write in the introduction of your book, in fact, If you’ve ever had lobbed at you by your boss in a crowded Zoom meeting in a moment when you’re more interested in your lunch tacos than a topic at hand, this is for you, right?
Somebody’s, the boss is lobbing something at you. Utter by a colleague in an elevator’s cramped confines as you’re leaving a big presentation they just gave that went horribly. They’re like, Hey, how did I do? Oh, great. Fantastic. Uh, uh, posed by a senior executive interviewing you for an attractive job as you dine with them and a half dozen members of their team, that could be awkward, or if you’ve ever had questions directed at you by an esteemed professor who’s called on you at random and large lecturer, this is so many different situations and we all freeze, Matt.
I mean, I think of every one of those, I would have frozen.
Absolutely, and most people do. Anxiety looms large in planned and spontaneous speaking. It’s part of being human, and when we’re put on the spot, we can freeze up, or we can feel really uncomfortable, and it’s largely because it’s part of who we are.
It’s because we want to do well and do right by the situation, and in some cases, we’re caught off guard. We didn’t plan it. So, it’s very, very challenging in those moments. the good news is that we can get better. You know, my book is full of counterintuitive ideas. One of them is that you can improve at spontaneous speaking.
Many of us feel like I’m either born that way or I’m not, I have the gift of gab or I don’t, but in fact, we can all get better. Well,
and what’s interesting to me is that you write that introverts want to prepare, right? I mean, if I’m going to this big thing, I want to prepare. So I’m going to, I’m going to memorize things.
Memorization, you say, is not the answer.
No, memorization actually works against us. And here’s why. It’s not just memorization, it’s when we want to get it right, we actually work against ourselves. It actually forces us to split our cognitive bandwidth. I am monitoring what I am saying as I’m saying it, which means I have less cognitive effort to be able to dedicate to what I’m saying.
And when you memorize, you create the thing that is right. At least in quotes. So, you know, I, I like to use the analogy of your computer. If you’re, if your computer or phone has lots of apps and windows open, you are so busy trying to parse through all of that information that your computer doesn’t do as well as it could.
It doesn’t perform as well, just like your brain doesn’t perform as well. So if we can turn that volume down, focus more of our effort on connecting with our audience, doing what needs to be done in that moment, we actually do better. So I like to actually tell my students to strive for mediocrity because in so doing you free up resources to do it really well.
Now, that doesn’t always go down well with a bunch of Stanford MBAs, but they get the idea. We’ve got to focus our cognitive bandwidth, not memorizing, being knowledgeable on what we want to talk about, having a structure at hand, but not having word for word planned out.
Well, and obviously with our limited time, we’re not going to get through everything, but I’m glad you can mentor us today.
And we’re, I want to walk through just the basics for people so that our stackers really get something to hang on to for this next big talk they have to give the next time they’re put on the spot. You start off with calm. People sometimes say things that throw you off your game. You had a potential boss gets you a question once about it, about an onion.
You truly did read the book. Yeah, so I went in for a job interview. This is now the last of after many interviews. I’m sitting down with the big boss. I show up. He’s already in the room, which is really unusual. Usually the executives come in late. First question out of his mouth. He looks at me and says, Matt, if you were an onion.
And I peeled back to the third layer. What would I find? Talk about being put on the spot. You know, I had nothing to do with anything I was doing in terms of the interview.
I’d have 12 minutes of silence, Matt. 12 minutes. I mean, I would
just sit there. I made a commitment in that moment. I took a deep breath, which helps to calm me down.
And I recommend many people do. I reminded myself that I’m sitting here in front of him because he and others think that I have value to bring to the organization. And I said, the first thing that came to mind, I said, onions make me cry. It was a manager’s position. I say, and when I put teams together, I want people to feel comfortable sharing their emotions and being able to be passionate or concerned.
And so I try to build teams that bring emotion and he smiled because this is totally not what he was expecting. I think he was expecting if you peel back the onion to the third layer, you’ll find that I work too hard and I’m too committed to, you know. All that stuff. I’m way too good an employee. Yeah, you know, right.
And we ended up having a fantastic conversation about psychological safety and how we build an environment where people can feel vulnerable. And I got the job. But again, what helped me get there was I calmed myself down. And when we get nervous speaking in front of others, we have to manage both our symptoms.
But also the sources, the things that make us nervous. So by taking a deep breath, I slowed my heart rate down, I slowed the jitteriness down. And by reminding myself that I had value to bring, I was in service of, of this company potentially, in that moment. And that’s short circuiting one of the sources of anxiety, which is, I’m not worthy, I don’t have anything valuable to say.
And that helped me get through it. So that helped me remain calm in a very pressing situation.
You’ve, uh, well, you have tactics all over this project, but, but a tactic that really caught my eye was, if we’re really feeling like we can’t get calm, you have a tactic around asking a question. Explain this.
Yeah. So I call this a back pocket question. So the number one fear people report to me after doing this for decades is that they are afraid that they will blank out. So in the midst of a conversation, they’re going to go blank, or if they’re, they’re giving a presentation, they can’t remember what to say.
So if you have that happen and you actually do blank out, which by the way, is not as frequent as we worry about it being, but if I were to blank out. One of the ways to give yourself a little bit of time is to distract your audience. Ask them a question that gets them focused on something else, not you.
So as a teacher, I will occasionally blank out. I teach the same class every quarter, twice a quarter, and I’ve been doing that for 13 years. Sometimes I can’t remember, did I say this now? Did I say this the last time? So I’ll simply pause and I’ll ask my students a question. I’ll say, take a moment and I want you to think about what we’ve just discussed and how could you apply that to your life?
And while they’re thinking that, it gives me just enough time so all of us can have a question that we can ask in a situation where we blink out. I could simply say, tell me what you’re thinking about how this links to what you’re planning on doing next, or how could this be a benefit to you? And while people are thinking and responding, I’m collecting my thoughts.
It’s fabulous.
I had to use techniques like this when I was on television, by the way, a PR company walked me through similar stuff, Matt, because, you know, they throw zingers at you and you’re on live TV and. It gives you just a second to maybe question the premise, whatever it might be. Your second key here is to unlock, and this is when you talked about maximizing mediocrity, which is what you just, what is so exciting about being mediocre and maybe being boring?
It’s
not the excitement. It’s the freedom that comes from it. When we put the pressure to do it right, striving for perfection, it gets in the way of our connection. And communication is all about connection. It’s about being present. It’s about doing what’s needed in the moment. rather than trying to be amazing.
And when we allow ourselves permission to do that, we can actually engage, educate, learn, and get our point across. So mediocrity simply means the effort we put to strive to get it right, gets in the way.
Man, that’s so nice too, because when you’re talking about this topic, I think about most of the conversations that I have in my life, you know, they’re kind of mediocre.
And, and so just, just to say, you know what, this is just going to be like anything else. And the second thing. And the part that really hit me hard is you said, this gets you away from presentation. It’s not a presentation. You use the word just now, Matt, it’s connection. Forget about presentation.
Absolutely. One of the things that makes people super nervous is the criteria that we judge ourselves against. When you ask people who’s a great speaker, most people will highlight a TED speaker, a leader, either a political leader or corporate leader. These are people who are giving planned presentations, who have been coached.
A lot. And in some cases have been edited what we actually see of them. So we’re holding this really high standard of what it means to be a good communicator. And most of these are in presentations, not conversations. So we have the wrong standard that we’re judging against, which makes us feel inadequate and nervous.
And we invest a lot in the planned moments and not enough in the unplanned moments. So we have really strong muscles on how to give a good pitch, on how to run a meeting well. But we don’t have those same strong muscles for how to apologize or how to introduce ourselves or how to give a toast, all of which are more frequent and sometimes more consequential than the pitch of the presentation that you’re giving.
I feel like social media makes it even worse because we see more of these little soundbite presentations, Matt, that often, you know, they’re so cut, they’re so scripted. And we feel like we got to be that person. I feel like that does make it worse. Absolutely.
Again, it has to do with the comparisons that we’re using.
And again, you know, a lot of people on social media are cultivating and curating that content. So what we’re seeing is them at their best and that’s not how life unfolds, right? And so it’s really hard to judge ourselves against that.
The third standard that you have is to redefine, I think maybe to redefine success.
And you talk about this is about mindset shifting.
Absolutely. So many of us, when we come into a spontaneous speaking situation, think Q& A or feedback, we feel very defensive. So if I know at the end of a presentation, I’m going to have spontaneous Q& A, I might feel real threatened by that. Like, here are the things I want to defend my position.
People are challenging me. And I’d like people to think rather as it’s an opportunity. This is a potential connection, a way to learn more, a way to find ways to collaborate. So if we re envision it, not as a threat or a challenge, but as an opportunity, it can change things dramatically. And in that chapter in particular, I have a whole bunch of tools and techniques that people can use to practice to become more opportunistic in their mindset for these circumstances.
Boy, and I love that about it is about practice, even for the company party, right? Just being in this, being in this and having different things thrown at you. Just a little practice, I think goes a long way. Second thing here, another mindset shift was thinking about how we talk about presentation about how it’s not all about you, Matt.
And man, I read this from, uh, Simon Sinek, actually, as I was reading your book. So I had to give a keynote a couple of weeks ago. And Simon Sinek, I saw somewhere said, forget about you. Remember, you’re just trying to teach these people something. You’re just, it’s about them. It’s about their thing. And I lost my place halfway through my keynote.
In fact, a couple of my friends said they saw me just all of a sudden I went, I’m in front of a conference of 2, 500 people. And I stopped for a second, and then all I had to do to calm down again, going back to calm, was to say, it’s not about me, it’s about these people. I think it’s the same in these conversations, make about
them.
Absolutely. So, in all communication, your job is to be in service of your audience. On my podcast, which has far fewer, episodes than yours. It’s all about communication. It’s called Think Fast, Talk Smart. The number one bit of advice my guests give is exactly what you just said. Be in service of your audience.
It’s not about you. It’s about them. Serve your audience. The best way I ever heard it said is a gentleman named Julian Treasure. He, he’s an expert on many things, including listening. And he said, what is this listening I am speaking into? I love that. It’s poetic, but we have to focus on our audience, the audience.
We have to be in service of them. And when you’re making small talk, Rachel Greenwald, who I know you’ve had on as a guest before, she’s, she’s fascinating. She’s a matchmaker and an academic. She taught me this one mantra. You want to be interested, not interesting. And when you put that emphasis on interested, that means you’re curious, you’re asking questions, you’re in service of the other.
When you’re trying to be interesting, you’re that person who’s trying to really ace it across the net. I use the comparison between hacky sack and tennis. When I am trying in small talk to really put myself out there and be somebody everybody pays attention to. It’s like trying to serve the tennis ball and ace it.
I just want to score. That’s not helping you have a good conversation. That’s focusing on being interesting. If I play hacky sack with you, where I take that beanbag and the whole job of us is to keep it off the ground, we set each other up. We make it easy for the next person to have that move to keep advancing our goal.
That’s being interested. So we need to change that perspective. To be
successful. You said your mother-in-Law was a ninja at this. Tell me about her. How was she so good at small talk?
Yeah, so my mother-in-Law had a black belt in small talk. She was amazing. So my wife and and family are from the Midwest. I live here out on the East coast, and when my mother-in-Law would get off the plane, we’d pick her up.
She would have at least three or four new best friends that she met on the plane, complete strangers and her success. Boiled down to three words, tell me more. So in talking to somebody, she’d ask a question, the person would respond, and she’d pause, look at them very curiously and say, tell me more. Now, I don’t know about you, but I grew up in a house where nobody asked anybody to say anything more.
It was always a competition to get your voice heard. So this to me was very intriguing, but I noticed that it was so powerful. And I encourage everybody. To invite others to share more, ask follow up questions, paraphrase what you’ve heard, this is the way you signal interest, this is the way that you connect, and this is the way that you act interested rather than interesting.
The number
of conversations I’ve had with people, as I look back, where I remember leaving parties, leaving events, Matt, and going, man, I, I love that person. And then I realized I found out nothing about them. They just kept me talking about me the entire time. And then I felt guilty. And then I felt like, man, I kind of lost out at that tennis game by not saying tell me more.
In fact, the whole time you’re talking, I’m thinking about a friend of mine, uh, who lives here in Texarkana. Her name’s Megan. She’s a Stanford trained lawyer. She’s the same. She’s the most interesting person at every party. And I realized maybe the third conversation I had with her, Matt, I didn’t know crap about her.
I didn’t know anything. I just found her fascinating because she could just keep the conversation about everybody else.
Yeah, that’s exactly right. When we are under pressure, talking about ourselves is probably the easiest thing to do. And those of us who are trying to further small talk along can help by asking questions.
Now, We need to balance that out though, because if the other person just feels interrogated and you don’t reveal anything about yourself, that sets up a very weird dynamic. Academics who study conversation distinguish between two types of turns. Supporting turns and shifting turns. So a supporting turn is where I support what you said.
So Joe, you might say, Hey, I just got back from Hawaii. A supportive response would be, Oh really? Which island? Now, a shifting response might be, Oh, I just got back from Costa Rica. Do you see how that changes the dynamic? Yep. Academics who study this say you want to have about two thirds to three quarters supporting responses, one third to a quarter shifting responses.
That way it feels like you’re both contributing, but you’re still focusing on having the other person.
You have three more steps here. Obviously we want to listen, we want to have structure, we want to focus. I just want to do one thing with those. You’ve got this wonderful technique, really a three part way to think about a conversation and how a good conversation goes.
Can you walk me through those three parts?
Absolutely. So one of the critical things that we have to think about in any communication is being structured. Rambling and listing information does not work. It is not helpful. Our brains are wired for structured information, beginning, middle, and an end. And I have a structure that I think works really well and can facilitate your contribution to a conversation, or it can actually be the initiator and follow through of the conversation.
Three simple questions. What? So what? Now what? The what is what you’re talking about, the so what is why it’s important, and the now what is what you’ll do next. So, if you were to come up to me, and you said we’re at a conference, and we just saw the keynote, and we’re having a chit chat afterwards, and you came up to me and say, hey Matt, what’s something of value you took away?
Notice how that’s a curiosity question, getting me to engage. I might say, I really found it interesting how the speaker was talking about the uses of AI. That’s my what. I think AI will fundamentally change how we do things in our industry. That’s the so what. I’m really curious to get your opinions of what you think about AI.
That’s the now what. So, by packaging up my information in that structure, it helps me to further the conversation and makes it easier for you to receive it. Now, if I want to initiate the conversation, that is, I’m coming up to you, I might ask you the what question. I might say, what brings you here? Or what about what we just saw is interesting?
That’s the what. And then when you tell me, I might say, Oh, so, so why is that important? What do you think you can do with that? That’s the so what and so on. So I can actually use the three questions in and of themselves as a way to move the conversation forward. Or, when I’m having to respond and give my thoughts, I can structure them in that structure, what, so what, now what.
So, I call it the Swiss Army Knife of communication because you can use it for so many
things. Well, and it’s so nice because, to your point, it’s not about presentation then. When you ask me about AI, I’m fascinated by your take, you gave me your take, because, you know, you talked about interrogation, I’ve been in those too, where somebody just keeps firing, I’m like, oh, okay, this is boring because you’re just asking me question after question about me.
And it’s pretty transparent and not, not that great. This is much more of a, of a back and forth. That’s exactly right. Yep. Yeah. Let’s get very specific here, here, Matt. We’re at the company party. That’s why we’re here now that we have some of your Superman. We get, we, we touched on some of the structure that you help us bring to the table, small talk.
I know I’m going to the company party. I know I’m going to this party with a bunch of strangers. How do I frame this in my head so that I have a good experience?
So small talk gets a bad rap. I think there are big things that can happen during small talk and I encourage everybody to think about how small talk enables you to learn about yourself and others.
It allows you to find connections. It allows you to potentially collaborate. Small talk can give you really big results. So first we have to go in thinking that. We remind ourselves that it’s about being curious and interested, not interesting. And we reassure ourselves that we know how to get in and out of small talk situations.
You get into a situation by asking questions that encourage others to give you detailed answers, not just a yes, no, fine sort of answer. And highlighting or pointing to things that are happening in the environment is a great way to do that. So I might go in and say, Wow, everybody seems to be wearing a blue shirt.
And did I miss the memo? And then the other person has something to latch onto. And then the other thing we have to think about is how we get out of these. And again, Rachel Greenwald taught me this wonderful technique. She calls it the white flag approach. If you know anything about auto racing, you wave the white flag before the race is over, and here’s how this technique works.
So I signal to you, Hey, in a minute, I want to go talk to those people over there. But before I do, I’m curious about, or I’d love for you to share more with me. And then when you finish, I say, thank you so much. This has been a lovely conversation. I’m going to go chat with those folks over there. I’ve alerted you in advance that I’m leaving.
I’ve told you where I’m going so you can form your own plan about where you go. And then we finish off the conversation and bring the plane to a smooth landing before we move on. So, uh, I love that approach. The white flattock approach helps me get out. And it helps me avoid these awkward situations where we always rely on biology.
I’m hungry, I’m thirsty, I have to go to the bathroom. And then the other person says, yeah, me too. And then all of a sudden, together we’re walking to the bathroom and I didn’t get out of the conversation. It’s
funny. I had, I had, I had one guest in one of these, uh, one of these years, uh, uh, tell me a biology technique.
She would carry around a plate that was empty, except for one little piece of broccoli or carrot or something and go, Oh, it looks like my plate’s empty and would, it would pivot. And you’re right. I kept thinking, what does somebody sees right through that? I mean, it’s pretty transparent.
Yeah. And, and, and I, I mean.
That piece of broccoli or carrots is going to get kind of stale after a while. I’d rather have something I can use that doesn’t need props.
Well, and also, you know, we all get itchy in a conversation, right? Especially, I have a couple of friends that are super introverts. I’m a bit of an introvert at pretending I’m an extrovert, but these people, if you stand with them, I had to realize my one friend that.
It is him, not me, Matt. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. And so if I’m having a conversation with him, I could feel really, really awkward just because that’s his demeanor. He’s a really cool guy once you get to know him. But man, in that situation, if I was standing across from him, I go, listen, I got to speak at bio break.
I’m just thinking that you talk about swiping left too early might not be the right thing. So I
have FOMO. In fact, I just interviewed the guy who created the term FOMO all those many years ago on my podcast, Fascinating Conversation, and I am often wondering if there is better, more different going on around me.
And what that means is I’m not present. I’m not connecting, which is a problem. And it means I’m missing out of the most important conversation I’m having, which is the one that’s happening right in front of me. So I work very hard to try not to swipe left or right. I work hard to focus and when I’m ready to move on for whatever reason, or since the other person is, I use that white flag approach and move forward.
So I, I’m definitely working on this. I wouldn’t say I’m an expert at it, but it’s definitely something important to me. That’s
what I like best is how vulnerable you are throughout this project about, you know what? It’s always a work in progress. You’re never going to be perfect. And it’s always about connection.
The book is called Think Faster, Talk Smarter, How to Speak Successfully when you’re put on the spot. And I think a lot of us can be put on the spot a lot here in December. Matt, it’s available everywhere, I assume.
It is. You name it. The podcast and the book are available wherever you get books and podcasts.
You can find me more at mattabrahams. com and I’m a huge LinkedIn user. If anybody wants to jump on there and have a conversation, happy to do so.
And we’ll share all those links on our, on our show notes page at stackybenjamins. com. By the way, you know, there’s only, you know, mom and mom’s friend listening to this.
Is there something coming up on the Think Faster, Talk Smarter podcast? You haven’t shared anywhere before that we should probably divulge today.
Absolutely. So at the beginning of the year, I’m very excited. Not only are we going to do an Ask Me Anything, but we are also, uh, we have a colleague of mine, his name is Huggy Rau, and I just interviewed Huggy and he is just.
Such an awesome guy, has amazing stories, and really is going to help all of us remove friction that gets in the way of our communication, which is right in line with what you and I are talking about. So I am happy to announce that we’re going to have less friction in our communication at the beginning of the new
year.
I’m laughing, Matt, because I just, I just cold called you. I put you right on the spot on that one and you stepped right up. See everybody?
Well, you know, you can do it with the methodology. That’s absolutely right. Thank you.
I’m Andy Dwyer. And when I’m not pulling suckers off my tomato plants in my garden.
I’m stacking Benjamins big thanks to Matt, you know, gee, it’s a time when whether you want to communicate or not, this is a, this is, this is a time where you’re going to find yourself in the company of strangers more often than not, you’re, you got the company Christmas party, you’ve got the neighborhood party, you’ve got the, the heck, you name it, it’s a great time to kind of Go back to the drawing board and remember the skills.
Sharpen the saw. I’m going
to walk around with an empty cup just so I can be like, Oh, look, I’m out of, out of wine.
I love how you hear nothing during these interviews. Oh, look, I have one piece of broccoli on my plate.
I’m going to go eat this broccoli by myself in the corner.
Get out of my house. Rather than talk to you, right?
Hey, let’s throw out the lifeline and help a stacker get better with money. If you need help, this is the part of the show where OG and I help you do better with money. And you know what? For being brave and asking the question that’s probably on a lot of other people’s mind, we also share with you some Stacking Benjamins swag.
Stackingbenjamins. com slash voicemails, how we answer your question. And today we are going to answer a question from Garrett. Hey Garrett.
Hi Joe and OG.
I’m in the middle of switching jobs right now. My current job has an HSA, but my new one will not. We are currently contributing the max to that HSA and we are thinking about what we should do with that monthly contribution once we don’t have the option of an HSA.
Should we create a separate savings account strictly for health expenses and contribute money there? Or would it be better to just continue to save that money for other goals we have, such as buying a house? For context on our situation, we currently have an emergency fund that would last six months and are maxing out a Thanks for the help.
Garrett, congratulations on the job change. I hope there’s congratulations in order there, OG. Yeah, he didn’t
say he was making more money, but uh, but maybe he
is. No, but hopefully he’ll, he’ll be uh,
Be happier, sorry, sorry. Maybe he’ll be happier. Happy place. Who cares about if you’re making more money.
That’s the theme today, brother. That is the theme. But this HSA, what does he do with that? So to
contribute to an HSA, you have to have a plan that’s eligible for an HSA. So you have to have a high deductible. healthcare plan. It will clearly state that in your documents that you get from your company or insurance provider.
If you have an HSA and then change jobs like Garrett’s doing to a plan that doesn’t have an HSA, you don’t have to get rid of it. You don’t have to spend it or you can just let it sit there, but you can’t contribute any more money to it. So that money should be invested just like he’s been doing and I think his question is was well, what do I do with the dollars that I have been saving into the HSA?
Should I put that in some other goals or should I put it in a separate account? I think that we spend a little bit too much time thinking about every dollar as a specific savings thing. Like, this is my retirement money, this is my health care money, this is my new car fund, or whatever. Because life is going to throw a lot of crazy things at you over a 40 year time horizon and we can have a good plan, but the reality is, is that, you know, if you need the money and you’ve got it in your 401k plan, the example that I always give just to kind of illustrate this point is, you know, imagine if your IRA had 45 million in it, we said 61 million before.
So say you have 45 million in your IRA and you want to buy a new car. Are you going to go finance the car or are you just going to take a withdrawal from your IRA? You know, I mean, probably you just withdraw from your IRA, right? I mean, you have 40 million. At the end of the day, I think the important piece here is to make sure that that money is actually being saved somewhere and not just kind of folded back into lifestyle.
At some level, probably because your health You might have some additional out of pocket costs relative to, you know, what you’re used to, or maybe your health premiums are higher than what they used to be, so that affects your take home pay. So you might wait just a month or two and see how that settles out in the new job.
But otherwise, just investing it into a brokerage account, you mentioned you’re maxing out. Roth IRA. Maybe you have the opportunity to max one out for your partner or spouse. Uh, maybe you have an opportunity to increase your contributions to your workplace 401k. Uh, on the Roth side is what I would do. Um, or just a regular brokerage account and have that money just invested and available for use for other things is perfectly fine.
I’m with you having financial flexibility. Uh, uh, you find that’s what a lot of people wish they had that they had more flexibility to be able to use dollars whenever they, whenever they wanted. Hey, you just don’t know
what the tax rates are going to be. You don’t know what the tax laws are going to be.
You don’t know what your situation is going to look like in 10 or 15 or 20 years. Um, you know, I mean, You can have, it’s like, it’s like when people say something about like 529 plans, like, how much did I put away for my kids for 529? It’s like, well, I don’t know. How much is tuition going to be in 20 years from now?
We don’t know the answer to that. We don’t know what the landscape of college education is going to look like in 20 years. There’s so much stuff going on with it right now. Well, you probably have to write some checks. Yeah, probably. Do you have to be able to write, you know, 65, 000 a year per kid for, you know, probably not because there’s grants and scholarships and maybe your kid joins the Marine Corps instead.
And so you want flexibility if all that money is stuffed in a 529. And you don’t have money in your 401k because of it. You know, you just don’t have the flexibility necessary to make choices when you get there. So a little bit of money in a whole bunch of places, I think, I think is a lot better over time.
I
remember sometimes people though on the far end, let’s go to the far end of this cause there’s two different battles, right? On one end, we’ve got the financial nerd battle, which is, I want to over optimize, which is what you and I were just fighting. On the other end though, in the larger community, There’s far more people who are going, well, why would I plan any of this stuff?
Because it, you know, if everything’s going to change, why plan? I think that going directionally toward your goals, however, and getting something in a place, I’d rather have too much money OG in the 529 plan. then
not enough anywhere else. Absolutely. Yeah. Back to my 40 million IRA example, right? Yeah. How many
times did people go, Oh, you know, I didn’t do a Roth IRA because I think those rules are all going to change.
So I just didn’t do it. No, you didn’t do it because you’re not saving money because you’re YOLOing it. Yeah. Yeah.
There’s a balancing act there. And at the end of the day, stuff costs money. And you should be able to do some basic math around here’s about how much money I’m going to need in a bucket. Is that bucket going to be taxable, tax deferred, tax free?
You know, is there going to be a penalty to take the money out? What happens if I need it sooner? Like, all of that is on the optimization side of things. But the fact that you need to save three grand a month? You just need to save three grand a month. Yeah, and it probably needs to be invested in some high Combination of stocks and you know some diversification not just sitting in your savings account.
Same thing with like an emergency fund, right? People say the same crap about emergency fund. I’m like, I don’t need an emergency fund. I’ve got a credit card I use credit cards like they’re going out of style brother. Let me tell you something. I got an email. I have them all Like I was literally thinking about this the other day.
I was like, I wonder what kind of, like, I was trying to plan a trip and I was thinking, I wonder if there’s some bonus point opportunities I could get. And I was going through like all the major brands. I’m like, nope, got that one. Nope, already did that one. Nope, already have that. There’s no, there’s nothing left on the table for me to get bonus points to like, you know, get a free airline ticket or something.
But anyways. I got an email from Capital One. I have a great credit score, low debt to income, low utilization. And they went, yeah, we’re changing your credit limit. Was 25, 000. Now it’s 5, 000. Holy! It’s like, that’s a really big change. You know, out of the blue, obviously I wasn’t using 25k of it, so it’s not like, it’s not like I needed it, but there’s some downstream effects to that, right?
It affects your utilization, your overall utilization, it changes the denominator of how much money you’ve got available to borrow. And, and so, To our point about, I don’t need a cash reserve because I’ll just borrow money from a credit card. It’s like, no, you have to have cash, man. You got to have cash.
You should have cash at home, like literal cash at home. Like those are things that, you know, just make your life easier. And that’s really what financial planning is about is trying to figure out the pain points in your life and, and figure out how to make, you know, how to make, how to make this a little bit easier along the way.
Suck less.
As, uh, the head of the household on Arrested Development said, there’s always money in the banana stand. There needs to
be. There needs to be money.
Keep some money in the banana stand. Thanks Garrett for that call. If you’ve got a question for us, stackyourbenjamins. com slash voicemail. By the way, Garrett, something else that’s coming up as we’re transitioning into the Backports segment.
This is the last segment of the show where we Uh, number one, talk about the community calendar, so I’ll turn it over to Doug here for a second on that. I gotta tell you, Stacey and our team and I, we are putting the finishing touches on our HR guide. And so Garrett, in the next couple weeks, we’ll have some, uh, some more on that for you to help you pick the right, uh, benefits for those of you in open enrollment that are making your decisions here at the year end.
We’re gonna, we’re gonna get that thing rolled out here. I’m super excited about it that we, uh, finally have this coming out. Big thanks, by the way, to Stacker Tracy for helping us on that. She’s a great HR manager in the Chicago area. Oh, gee, you remember. And actually, Doug, you were there too. You guys remember Tracy who helped us put on the event in Aurora.
Tracy gave us a lot of HR director support on that guide. So in a couple of weeks, we’ll have more on that, but we got a lot for people today, Doug, what’s on our calendar. And, uh, I think you might have some other stuff for us. Well,
Joe, uh, tomorrow at 5 o’clock Eastern, we’ve got an Instagram Live. Those are always fun, and you’ve always got great guests there, so everybody listening, make sure you join us on Instagram tomorrow afternoon.
But you know what I really want to talk about today is, uh, who won our contest. Jennifer McAndrews, she won the charcuterie board, and uh, what she said to us was fantastic. She said, Thank you! Pass along my sincerest thanks to Joe, Doug, and Karen. Mostly Doug, specially Doug and OG. I love that I won the contest, but it’s your team’s commitment to financial education.
That’s the true win. All the best, Jennifer. So thank you, Jennifer McAndrews for your service and, uh, for that great note.
Appreciate that. Jennifer, I believe it was in the, uh, Air Force. And thank you, Jennifer, from all of us for your service. That was a great giveaway. And, uh, Lacey Langford who joined us on Instagram, Doug, you remember, we had a big fight about whether that was charcuterie or charcuterie.
She thought it should be, we should talk about cuter, not cooter, but it turned out that a cooter is charcuterie is
the correct way to say that. If you say charcuterie, it’s like saying croissant.
Like you’re trying too hard. Anyway, Jennifer, thank you so much. And, uh, I know we got a lot of great giveaways coming up, uh, early next year.
We’re going to do, we’re going to do another one, uh, coming up in either late January or early February. Oh, gee, at this point in the show, we often talk about what, uh, movies we’re watching. And you said on Monday, when I talked about the, uh, Osage movie about the Scorsese movie, speaking of pronunciations, uh, that you’ve been on planes watching some movies.
Saw a number of
them over the last couple of weeks. And also, have you heard about this Napoleon movie? Like, did
we talk about this? Uh, well, I said on Monday that I really wanted to see it, and I hadn’t seen it yet, and then I saw the, the reviews. I also know people that went and saw it. Hated it. You
did see it.
No, no, no, no, I didn’t. Oh. No, I’ve just, everybody’s saying it’s awful. Like, in terms of stories.
Well, here’s what I heard. And what’s funny is I spent the weekend with my brother in law who’s a big, uh, history buff. And he’s like, Oh, gee, saying the same thing that a lot of the, the, the people are saying, there’s just too much Napoleon to squeeze it into two to three hours.
There’s just way too much. So they show up on these battlefields. It’s Ridley Scott. So it’s beautiful. and the battle scenes are well done, but like how we got there, what the hell was really going on? Like any of the backstory, they got to try to cram all that stuff in. Uh, that was his take.
Interesting.
Well, if you find yourself on a plane and Napoleon’s not on it yet, which it won’t be. There were, uh, I saw three, I watched three movies. So, popcorn movie, Fast, and the Furious X.
I haven’t seen one of those yet. You haven’t? I haven’t
seen it. You know what? Me neither. They’re not awful, I’ll be honest. Like, they’re probably in the same genre as, like, all the Avengers movies.
You know, they have the same plot, story, everything. You know, but they, they link them together. You know, like, this person’s a bad guy and shows up in… Two seasons later because he’s finally out of prison or something, two movies later. I don’t know, seeing race cars racing down the highway and stuff, that’s kind of, kind of fun.
Anyway, fun to watch a little popcorn movie on an airplane. And then I saw two other ones that were similar, but I think the one that I liked the most out of all of them was this one called Covenant.
John,
you
have tallies approaching.
I still don’t remember a thing.
I don’t
remember any of it.
I only remember
the interpreter.
Why he wants this job? I need the money. Don’t disappoint.
Turn out to be a pain in
the ass. No. Not me,
sir. Money isn’t the reason he wants this job.
It’s Alabama killed his son.
Stop the vehicle,
Sergeant. We don’t want to go down this road. You’re
out of your bounds, Ahmed.
You’re here to translate. Actually, I’m here to interpret.
John, you have tallies approaching.
So this is a story of a, uh, operations unit in Afghanistan. And as we know, the U. S. military used uh, local interpreters to kind of help with the translation and, you know, the basically guides, right? Hired by the U. S. military. So this guy that they bring on board, uh, to their unit has a lot of other stuff going on in the background.
His, his family was, was murdered by the Taliban. Also, there’s an incentive in it for them. If they live through all of this. they had get access to a green card, which nowadays, as you read the news about this, there’s a lot of controversy going on with that of people who are still not able to get their green cards despite, you know, years of service to the, to the U.
S. military. So there’s that. About halfway through the movie, it kind of wraps up, you know, so the long, the short of it is, is that under attack, one of the service members gets captured. That’s Jake Gyllenhaal’s character. And then the interpreter rescues him. Basically carries him all the way home, drags him, carries him, you know, whatever and Encounters a lot of bad guys, but then he gets home and you go, oh, okay The movie’s over and you look at the time and there’s still an hour left.
Well, the movie’s not over yet So it all centers around this struggle that this guy has with going. Hey, he saved me now I have to go save him. So he’s out of the military now, but he still feels this obligation to go rescue his Interpreter who, who now has got basically a wanted, you know, wanted felon by the Taliban because he helped the Americans and so there’s a lot of, you know, there’s a lot of shoot him up, blow him up stuff, but there’s some pretty interesting dynamics that are going on here of the challenge that the service member faces of You know, with his family, he’s at home, you know, he’s got his wife and kids at home and everything’s great and he’s like, and I gotta go back.
His family’s not too excited about that. There’s a lot of neat stuff there.
The reason I like the Mission Impossible movies is that although they’re shoot em up, blow em up popcorn movies, the stakes always feel really high and they do a great job of making you feel like, no, that’s what they have to do.
Like there’s been many, you talked about Marvel movies earlier, there’s been many Marvel movies where I’m like, I just don’t care who wins. Like, I seriously don’t care. This does not matter to me. I think the best part about this movie, and this is one of my favorite movies that I’ve seen in the past couple of years, is that, uh, is that everything has such high stakes, although on one level, there’s all these international implications and it’s obviously around this, this huge battle going on, but the two of them getting along and then, uh, helping each other, these people that, Frankly, on a surface level, they share so little and helping each other.
Just, just freaking incredible. Just a great, I walked in thinking I might like this movie. I walked out going, that was, that was phenomenal. Jake Gyllenhaal, really good. The guy that plays the interpreter. Um, I’ve never seen him in a movie before. Just amazing, amazing acting. So I’m with you, man. Big thumb up on, uh, on the covenant.
Great stuff. Doug, have you seen this one? Yeah. I have not. No. I think you’d really like this movie. It’s a good
flick. Yeah. Good flick.
Cool. I’ll check it out. All right. That’s a great place to leave it. Thank you everybody for hanging out with us again today. We got another great show coming on Friday.
Don’t forget the 201, uh, tomorrow where we’ll dive more into communication tips. So important this month, but let’s stack up the to do list. Doug, what to do’s are we stacking today? Well, Joe, our first
to do is take some advice from Matt Abrahams and hang on a little longer during those small talk sessions at a party.
What seems like a difficult conversation could become a great connection if you just give it a chance. Second, take out a calendar and begin planning what you’re going to do in 2024. Happiness isn’t necessarily about more money. It’s about aligning income with spending so you can be confident that you’re making progress towards your goals.
But the biggest to do? Apparently, experts recommend actually coming up with some kind of script or something before going to the pulpit and just… Talking. And here I always thought public speaking only involved a great voice, good looks, and tons of charisma like I already have. Now you’re telling me I gotta prep, too?
I’m out!
Thanks to Matt Abrahams for joining us today. You can find his book, Think Faster, Talk Smarter, wherever books are sold. We’ll also include links in our show notes at stackingbenjamins. com This show is the property of SP Podcasts, LLC, copyright 2023, and is created by Joe Saul Sehy. Our producer is Karen Repine.
This show was written by Lisa Curry, who’s also the host of the Long Story Long podcast, with help from me, Joe and Doc G from the Earn Invest podcast. Kevin Bailey helps us take a deeper dive into all the topics covered on each episode in our newsletter called The 201. You’ll find the 411 on all things money at The 201.
Just visit stackingbenjamins. com slash 2 0 1. Wonder how beautiful we all are? Of course, you’ll never know if you don’t check out our YouTube version of this show, Engineered by Tina Ichenberg. Then you’ll see once and for all that I’m the best thing going for this podcast. Once we bottle up all this goodness, we ship it to our engineer, the amazing Steve Stewart.
Steve helps the rest of our team sound nearly as good as I do right now. Want to chat with friends about the show later? Mom’s friend Gertrude and Kate Youngkin are our social media coordinators, and Gertrude is the room mother in our Facebook group called The Basement. Say hello when you see us posting online.
To join all the basement fun with other stackers, type… StackingBenjamins. com. Not only should you not take advice from these nerds, don’t take advice from people you don’t know. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any financial decisions, speak with a real financial advisor. I’m Joe’s mom’s neighbor Doug and we’ll see you next time back here at the Stacking Benjamins show.
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